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Visiting and Supporting Trafficking / Modern Slavery Survivors in Detention

AVID was delighted to offer a free training for visitors groups from all over the UK.

On 14th March, we welcomed volunteer visitors from across the UK to the session – from as far afield as Oxford. 18 volunteer visitors from 4 different visitors groups participated in this valuable training session. The training room was filled with lots of diverse experience in terms of visiting and experiences dealing with vulnerable people; it varied from just a couple of months of visiting more than 10 years.

This training was timely to raise awareness and improve the knowledge of visitors because, despite home office's own policy, visitors groups continue to see survivors of trafficking/ modern slavery in immigration detention. In addition to that, the recent HMIP report on Harmondsworth stated that staff at the centre lacked knowledge and confidence to refer to the National Referral Mechanism, through which cases of human trafficking are referred. Only 8% of staff interviewed knew what the NRM was.

You can find out more information and recommendation, from our member group, Detention Action's recent research report on survivors of trafficking - here.

The session was led by Elizabeth Flint, who is an expert practitioner with long-standing experience of providing direct support, advice and guidance to survivors of trafficking/modern slavery, and to practitioners and services supporting such individuals. She also has extensive experience in providing crisis intervention and support for survivors of trafficking/modern slavery. She has attended and assessed a number of people in immigration detention before, both in her capacity as an advocate and more recently as an independent expert witness.

The training covered human trafficking issues globally and in the UK as specific focus on detention, facts and figures, introductions to National Referral Mechanism(NRM) and most importantly how can visitors/ visitors group support someone that has been exploited and/or trafficked or that is at risk of the same and how to help them access support. This training was a great opportunity for the visitors to develop and understand support needs of trafficking survivors, barriers and frustrations they face in detention.

Feedbacks from the attendees were very positive. Initially, 35% mentioned that they have visited someone who was potential survivors of trafficking or modern slavery, with at least 94% of attendees saying they felt confident and this improved their knowledge on supporting survivors of trafficking/ modern slavery people in detention.

“Great overview and introductions to this issue! As a visitor – practical advice or what to do in these circumstances were valuable to learn. The speaker, Beth was very experienced!"

Training participant 2018

Let us know if your group would like to follow up and receive similar training and how to better support vulnerable people in detention.